The ash discharged from the garbage burning furnace after being cooled by cooling water contains a large quantity of water together with solids and metals. Therefore, in the pretreating unit for the ash, bulky materials are first removed from the ash, then solids of diameters larger than a predetermined value are separated from the remaining ash and the separated solids are crushed by a crusher for further separation of new solids resulting from such crushing. Further, after the ash removed of the solids is dried and then removed of the metals, the ash is supplied to the ash supply hopper of the ash melting furnace. The ash supply hopper is provided with an ash supply port and an ash pusher at the bottom thereof which moves forward and rearward with respect to the supply port so that the ash in the supply hopper is supplied into the ash melting furnace.
The ash pretreating process according to the prior art technique has had the problem that it is complicated tending to cause troubles and the ash supply hopper sometimes becomes unable to supply the ash due to the occurrence of a bridge phenomenon in the ash and further, the amount of supply of the ash to the melting furnace tends to vary.
The present invention has for its object to provide an ash melting furnace and a method for supplying an ash to the melting furnace which can eliminate the above-described prior part problems. That is, the ash melting furnace and the method according to the present invention makes it possible to simplify the ash pretreating unit, prevent the occurrence of the bridge phenomenon in the ash in the ash supply hopper and supply the ash into the melting furnace in a stabilized state.